Goldfish with Elmo

Watch The Video

Pet expert Marc Morrone and Elmo of "Sesame Street" talk about the best ways to care for Elmo's pet goldfish, Dorothy. Goldfish need space to swim around, Marc says, and should be kept in a tank rather than a typical goldfish bowl. Be sure to fill the tank with enough water: For each inch of goldfish, you should provide a gallon of water.

Goldfish also need good filtration; without it, they can't survive. They need to have a good, clean environment. All of the waste from the fish must be cleaned out and filtered to keep the water fresh. In a bowl, goldfish are forced to live in their waste, which is not good for them.

You can fill your fish tank with all sorts of things for decoration and stimulation. Make sure not to shock your new fish by just putting them into the tank. To acclimate a fish to the temperature in a new or cleaned tank, float the fish inside a water-filled bag in the tank for a few minutes before releasing.

If you are set on using a fishbowl instead of a tank, you can get a Betta fish, an air-breathing fish that evolved in Southeast Asia. They live in stagnant puddle water, so they can easily survive in fishbowls for long periods of time; just be sure to completely clean the water in the fishbowl every other day.